With our garden still producing delicious tomatoes, I am always on the lookout for new ways to use them. On a recent episode of The French Pub, Chef Edward Delling-Williams served a baked camembert with a tomato chutney. Unfortunately his recipe isn’t published so I had to come up with one of my own.

Although I was inspired, I was also a little skeptical that chutney and cheese would go well together. I’m not sure why I felt this way given that fruit and cheese are a classic pairing (and tomatoes are technically fruit). But my skepticism didn’t deter me. After looking at many different recipes, I did some testing and came up with this recipe.

Tomatoes past their prime

One of the problems we face is after sharing our harvest with friends and family (and not a small amount sacrificed to the birds), we often have tomatoes spilling all over our counter. Before we can get to them, many of the tomatoes are overripe and getting soft. These are, in fact, the best tomatoes to use in this recipe.

One-pot wonder

Another great thing about this recipe is its ease. Everything is chopped, grated, or tipped into a pot at the same time. Everything cooks away for an hour or two, requiring a little stirring every so often. Once the chutney is cooked and cooled it’s ready to serve. I prefer running a stick blender through the mixture a few times – not to liquify it but to breakdown some of the larger bits like the skins from the tomato. A bit of texture is good but not big chunks.

Serving

Following the original inspiration, I served the tomato chutney with a warm brie and it was delicious. At first I thought that the chutney would be too tangy against the cheese but it was perfect – the warm, creamy cheese balancing with the tomatoes. I highly recommend it.

The chutney also works very well as a sandwich spread, almost like a pickle. Delicious!

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